Snowboarding, skiing, wakeboarding, and similar sliding sports are increasing in popularity as competitive sports and as recreational activities that are being participated in by numerous people. The sliding boards used in these sports or activities, such as snowboards, skis, wakeboards, and other sliding boards, are continually developing, with new technology improving their functionality and performance.
In recent years, snowboarding has gained in popularity and is nearly as popular as skiing. Unfortunately, the safety aspects of snowboarding equipment lag behind that developed for skiing, particularly with respect to the binding systems provided to secure the snowboard to the feet of the rider. The form of snowboard binding which is currently most broadly used includes two bindings fastened to the snowboard, each binding having a plurality of straps adapted to fasten around a respective boot of the rider. In use, the rider places his or her boot clad feet on the bindings and tightens the straps around the boots to secure the board to the rider's legs. In order to remove the board, the rider must manually and individually unfasten each of the straps to release the snowboard bindings from the rider's boots. Other types of fasteners and bindings are also available, which include plate bindings and step-in bindings.
One significant drawback to these types of bindings is that they are not releasable, meaning that they provide no release function that permits a user's foot to release from the snowboard in response to an undesirable and potentially unsafe load. It is known that the majority of snowboarding injuries are caused or exacerbated by the snowboard remaining secured to the user during a fall. In some extreme cases, fatalities have resulted from suffocation in deep snow with the user unable to release from the snowboard and snowboard binding. With the snowboard unreleased and still attached to the rider's feet, the length of the snowboard can act as an anchor in the event of a snow slide or avalanche, and once covered in snow the rider may not be able to reach the binding straps in order to remove the board. It may therefore be desirable for a snowboard binding to enable the rider's feet and legs to be released from attachment to the board in the event the snowboard is subjected to abnormal forces, such as may occur in the case of a severe fall or an avalanche.
Another difficulty associated with snowboard bindings occurs where the rider wishes to use a ski lift or tow to return to the top of a mountain slope. In order to negotiate lift lines and mount a lift chair, the rider must generally free one foot from the board to facilitate maneuvering into position. Once exiting the lift chair, the free boot must then be re-fastened within the free binding on the snowboard. This constant cycle of unfastening and re-fastening the conventional binding is both physically exhausting and time consuming, and it would therefore be desirable for an improved snowboard binding to enable easier securing and releasing of at least one boot from the board when desired.
Ski bindings are traditionally designed to release the ski from the ski boot if abnormal forces are present between the ski boot and ski binding, so that those forces are not transmitted to the skier's leg where they may cause injury. However, in order to provide adequate and safe release, or tension release, complex mechanisms are employed within the ski bindings. These complex mechanisms typically provide only a limited number of release angles, thus increasing the potential that an impact or other force will not trigger a justified release. Despite their deficiencies, it would be advantageous for snowboard bindings to have a similar tension release mechanism, such that the likelihood of injury is decreased in the event of a severe fall, particularly one in which the body or legs of the snowboarder twist relative to the board.
Another problem with prior related bindings is that there is no interchangeability between the types of sliding boards, thus increasing the expense of participating in more than one sliding sport. Indeed, individuals often like to snowboard, wakeboard, etc. as well as to ski. For example, an individual may want to ski in the morning using alpine skis but later ski in the afternoon on a snowboard. In order to do so, the individual would have to change the type of boots being worn in order to use the alpine skis or the snowboard. Accordingly, it would be a benefit to provide a universal binding that would be as efficient and applicable for alpine skis as it is for snowboards. Further, this universal binding should also be adaptable to other sliding boards, including, but not limited to water skis, wakeboards, and others.